Grace Wales Bonner - Artistic Director of Hermès Menswear

[Frederic01]

FTHTSI

 

[youthinasia]

Big shoes to fill

 

[Creative]

Happy for her!

 

[Norden]

Im beyond happy for her. I’ve always loved her clothes, vision and just the consistency in her work. Really gutsy choice from Hermes, but I can see her being loyal and dedicated to the craft of the house. She might hit a similar feeling that Lemaire hit.
Fantastic news, can’t wait to see what she does. This might even make me wanna break the bank for these clothes.

 

[Frederic01]

Beloved Indie Designer Gets a Big New Job at Hermès​

Grace Wales Bonner is the new creative director of men’s wear at the French fashion house.

By Jacob Gallagher Oct. 21, 2025 Updated 5:53 a.m. ET


Ms. Wales Bonner’s name has come up for many prominent positions over the years. After much speculation, she has a new gig.Credit...Bafic for The New York Times

Getting one’s dream job is rare. For British fashion designer Grace Wales Bonner that dream is now a reality.

Ms. Wales Bonner, a 35-year-old Londoner, who years ago, said in an interview with System magazine that it was her dream to work with Hermès, was today named creative director of men’s wear for the prominent French fashion house.

For Ms. Wales Bonner, this move is one the oddsmakers of the fashion world have long forecast. For years, Ms. Wales Bonner, who founded her eponymous label in 2014, straight out of London’s Central Saint Martins College of Art and has had a longstanding collaboration with Adidas, has been name dropped as a top candidate anytime a major job at a luxury label opened up (she’s been rumored to be up for top positions at Louis Vuitton and Givenchy).

Her appointment bucks the industry’s current inclination toward creative directors that share two criteria: pale and male. Ms. Wales Bonner, whose father was born in Jamaica, is now the first ever Black woman to lead design at a major fashion house.

In a news release, Pierre-Alexis Dumas, General Artistic Director of Hermès, praised Ms. Wales Bonner’s “take on contemporary fashion, craft and culture.”

More specifically for Hermès, Ms. Wales Bonner will take over a position that until last week was one of the fashion industry’s great constants. Last Thursday, Véronique Nichanian stepped down as artistic director of Hermès’ men's wear division after 37 years.

Even as the pace of designer musical chairs has quickened, with creative directors serving tenures no longer than a presidential term, Ms. Nichanian held onto the reins at Hermès. As she crossed into her 70s, Ms. Nichanian continued to design with a sprightly flair, keeping Hermès’ wealthy male clients on their toes with jewel-toned leathers, blanket-lined parkas and velvety suits. Her final collection for the brand will be shown in Paris in January. Mr. Wales Bonner’s first collection for Hermès will be shown in January 2027.

Beyond being young and British, Ms. Wales Bonner is a very different sort of designer than Ms. Nichanian. Cerebral and soft-spoken, Ms. Wales Bonner’s collections pull inspiration from the Black diaspora.

Her debut collection, titled “Ebonics” was a meditation on flared trousers, shawl collar jackets and a knit that read “The Black Genius.” Like a professor guiding her students, images of the collection are accompanied on the Wales Bonner website by a list of references including “Giovanni’s Room” by James Baldwin and “Invisible Man” by Ralph Ellison.

Her academic approach has continued as Ms. Wales Bonner became a fixture of the Paris fashion week calendar, and expanded into women’s wear. Black American colleges were the starting point for a collection of “WB” varsity jackets, fair isle knits and duffle coats. The story of a Black member of the Medici family led her to regal stud-collared dress shirts, hourglass cinched blazers and tailcoat-like jackets.

“I see my research as an artistic practice — it really is the foundation of everything I do — and clothing is a very direct way to communicate some aspects,” she told the The New York Times in 2023.

Ms. Wales Bonner has, over the past decade, achieved wunderkind status. She has dressed F1 driver Louis Hamilton for the Met Gala and made T-shirts with Solange. She has won a bevy of design awards and been appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire. In 2019, she collaborated with Dior on a macramé reimagining of its stalwart bar jacket and skirt.

Ms. Wales Bonner has also made an impression beyond fashion, having curated an exhibit at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and hosted a series of musical performances at London’s Serpentine Galleries, with acts including Sampha and Laraaji.

She has demonstrated a shrewd commercial eye that likely made her appealing to a label like Hermès, one of the last remaining independent French fashion houses. Ms. Wales Bonner is, indeed, perhaps best known for her longstanding Adidas collaboration, in which she artfully riffs on many of the brand’s established styles. See: her silver-tipped version of the Millennium sneaker or her Big Bird yellow version of the mesh SL76 shoe. Most of all, she deserves credit for turning the label’s once-stale Samba sneaker into a must-have. Her versions, in navy croc, leopard and crochet continue to sell for several hundred dollars on resale sites like StockX.

One imagines that Hermès wouldn’t mind Ms. Wales Bonner minting a hit like that in her new role.

NYTIMES

 

[neogrotesque]

Omg I didn't expect this but I'm excited already. I hope she'll also finally be able to further flesh out her ideas for her own label and maybe bring a little bit of her vintage glam from her womenswear side into the menswear as well.

 

[RosesAreRed]

Hm… I hope she will not make it too weird

 

[visvim2001]

ah yes can’t wait for Hermes tracksuits and other roadmen gear

 

[Norden]

How lovely that she dreamt about this. Such a sweet story really cute.

 

[Avonlea]

Nothing exciting about it, but good for her.

 

[GivenchyAddict]

After rejecting so many offers, she was right to wait because she took an amazing job.

I think it will be very much interesting and it says quite a lot on Hermes’ ambitions.

 

[Marc10]

Fantastic pick! Very happy for her. I’m sure she had all the other brands reaching out but this feels like the right fit. I say go ahead and give her creative direction of the whole brand!

 

[Kanzai]

It’s a groundbreaking appointment, but I think she can handle it well. I was hoping for a French designer of color, à la Olivier Rousteing, but the British took the win this time (again). IMO, France has a richer and more "undercover" multicultural background than the UK (Mbe I’m a bit biased lol, I’ve always loved France and its Black/drill music culture).

 

[psychopsist]

wow, congratulations to her!

 

[WinstonH20]

Happy for her!

I've always thought of her as more of a clothes-maker than a fashion designer..so basically perfect for Hermès menswear.

 

[Kanzai]

^Yohji Yamamoto himself said he’s a clothes-maker, he hates the term “fashion designer” so I wouldn’t consider it as an underestimation. It's Hermes so probably a "glorified clothes-maker".

 

[TaylorBinque]

Congrats to her. I already like how the news rolled out with an exclusive on NYT. Definitely looking forward to her vision

 

[PDFSD]

^Yohji Yamamoto himself said he’s a clothes-maker, he hates the term “fashion designer” so I wouldn’t consider it as an underestimation. It's Hermes so probably a "glorified clothes-maker".

hermes is craft maker above all and the craft of clothes making falls under it especially when its involves leather and silk everything leads back to the saddle making which they never let go wisely.

i had a meeting with grace in the past all i can say is she is kind and open minded and genuinely want to do interesting things that have meaning i left that meeting holding her in a higher regards then before.
she will be one that i expect to truly grow into her new job with grace.
wishe her truly the best , and its very punk chic of hermes this move and i love it.

 

[tricotineacetat]

The trajectory of her career so far made it plausible she would one day get a job with one of the heritage brands.

She is very inoffensive as a designer, somebody who can provide the continuity Hermès is looking for, while at the same time providing a gentle rejuvenation.

It's really not one of the worst appointments in the recent time!

 

[Xone]

2027? they will make her a complete induction for a year...